


On This Snowy Shore

by SleepySpeedster



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Fear, Feelings Realization, Heartless Attacks (Kingdom Hearts), Longing, M/M, Memories, Nostalgia, Reminiscing, Temporarily Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2019-09-08
Packaged: 2020-10-12 18:43:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20569082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SleepySpeedster/pseuds/SleepySpeedster
Summary: Riku ponders the differences between the freezing Land of Dragons and his own home. Everything is so different, yet familiar at the same time. He can't help but think of home and Sora amidst it all.----This fic takes place during Sora's second visit to The Land of Dragons. I was thinking about how Riku kept running from Sora during these scenes and started to draw parallels to Destiny Islands. I did change some of Riku's actions from those scenes.





	On This Snowy Shore

**Author's Note:**

> *** Comments and your thoughts on this work are always appreciated. Give this work a kudos if you liked it. Comments and kudos help me to create more work and figure out what I should work on. ***
> 
> If you have any additional tags you think I should tag this as feel free to suggest them.

The cold of the mountains bit at Riku’s skin, and the snow that managed to reach him from beneath his black hood would catch him by surprise like a cold and sudden prod of a finger to his cheek as he slept. In a way it did wake him up. He was aware of just how different this small portion of the world was to the home he knew. It was so different to the Destiny Islands, where the warmth of the sun was perpetually on his back. Here in The Land of Dragons the cold sapped the warmth from his core, and the snow at his feet as he walked down the mountain made him feel sluggish. It was nothing like the Destiny Islands.

Riku laughed a small single laugh that only he and the mountain range were privy to. 

The Land of Dragons_ wasn’t _supposed to be like his home. It was a strange and funny little thought to have now of all times. Here he was on a mission to warn the Emperor, but still he couldn’t help, but think of his home and his friends. Kairi was safe on the islands living out a normal life, going to school he imagined, and Sora–

Sora was out amongst the worlds just like he was.

A small smile had settled on his lips, but his chest felt even tighter, and the weight on his shoulder’s heavier.He missed them. Kairi would never let them get away with anything, calling himself and Sora ‘lazy bums’ in that teasing way she did, and Sora was always there, right beside him with that wide goofy smile; he could light up anything with that smile of his. The world wasn’t so dark with him right by your side. Riku was certain of that.

But even just in his own thoughts, his best friend, lit up the way in front of him. He was so certain that his chest ached. It had been a long time since he had seen his best friend. It had been so long since he and Sora had shared a smile together. Not one shared from one side of a door to the other, nor as he watched his friend sleep a long year long sleep as his memories were put back together, but rather a smile that they both could partake in together. One in which they could laugh together, and hug, and see their loved ones again. 

Together.

As he stopped at the edge of the mountain village’s gate Riku had grown homesick without even realizing it. He turned to the mountain he had just climbed down, and looked to its peak. Even if it was just a small piece of this world it was vastly taller and larger than the island he called home. It was so different, yet the cold and the snow had done more to thaw him than to freeze him. It reminded him so much of home and those he dearly missed. Or maybe he had always missed them all from the first moment he had stepped off from their home world. However, the reality of his situation was a hard one. Riku knew that. He knew he couldn’t go home regardless of how he felt.

He couldn’t go home like he was now. He couldn’t face–

“Look!” A voice yelled from behind him, and for the first time Riku realized just how different everything was.

It was Sora’s voice that called out to him, and for a moment he hadn’t recognized it. He hadn’t recognized his own best friend’s voice, and a sensation squeezed at his chest. The youthful voice that he remembered from his childhood had changed. Sora had grown, and things had changed.

As Sora stood there along with his friends. His name almost left Riku’s lips. He almost called out to him, as elation squeezed his heart, but he stopped himself. There was another pang, another painful squeeze of his heart that it almost felt like it would pop. He wanted to see his friend again, to talk to him again, to hug him, and to laugh, but he couldn’t. From beneath the hood of the Organization XIII cloak his eyes caught Sora’s, and without a second thought he suddenly turned on his heels and ran back toward the mountain summit as quickly as he could. It was anxiety that coursed through him. Anxiety of being seen as he was, a denizen of the darkness. His hand clench the fabric over over his heart. There were so many thoughts and feelings that pulled the strings of his heart, tugging him one way and then another. Happiness, and then hesitation which beget fear and longing. 

Riku ran faster. The snow crunched beneath his feet with each step and sprayed the air behind him as he raced up the mountain. Cold air rushes into his lungs with each breath and it burns, but Riku is running hot. Everything was different and familiar all at the same time. Everything reminded him of Destiny Islands. He hears Sora chasing after him, he’s not too far behind now as they get closer and closer to the summit. Sora yells for him to wait, and before Riku realizes what he’s doing he turns his head back to Sora and almost yells, “Come on, Sora! Giving up, already?” But he catches himself.

This wasn’t a race on Destiny Islands. He and Sora weren’t competing to name their little raft before they went out to sea. Yet, still he had been excited in the exact same way. He ran faster, his breath released in hot puffs as he kept his lead over Sora. He wanted to win in the same childish way as when they would race back home. The thought he had always been better than his friend had pervaded his mind in his youth, but now that thought had transformed. With all their games and competitions, and keeping score he had wanted to keep Sora close. He had wanted him close in a way he couldn’t describe then.

Riku stops at the summit. The buzzing beyond the peak already catching his ear as he turned and watched as Sora race up to him. 

Even as he traveled the worlds, the ones he had so excitedly sought out, he found himself unable to forget his friends. Even when he had found Sora, there had been a happiness in his heart that was more than the sensation of being found and reunited, but when he had saw Sora’s new companions he had been jealous and hurt. He had been cast aside so easily, and within his heart he had been hurt. Through that pain, that betrayal, he let the darkness in. And just like his jealousy it had consumed him so quickly.

“Hey you! Quit running off!” Sora yells at him with his keyblade in hand.

Riku tilts his head beneath the cloak, a sign of confusion, but even as he did so an unseen smile played on his lips. Running off? No. I was beating you, Sora.

He knows it was a childish thought, but Sora brought them out in him.

The buzz grew louder and louder as heartless cascaded down the summit and surrounded them all. It was a deafening noise as they flew so close around himself and Sora.

“Sora.” Riku murmured amongst the deafening noise of the heartless and summoned his keyblade, one arm outstretched to guard, and the other with his keyblade in hand poised for attack as he solely stared down his best friend. The heartless didn’t matter to him in this moment, nor the companions Sora had brought along. It was just Sora.

He needed this. 

He wanted this.

Riku’s heart was beating with an excitement he hadn’t felt in a long time. These feeling he had held inside of him for so long, those feelings that once went nameless to him were beginning to overflow.

Sora rushed towards him, kicking up the loose snow with each bounding step closer to him. Whatever he was thinking in those moments as he got closer and closer, would change.

The clang and scrape of their keyblades against one another sang and pierced the buzz of the hundreds of heartless. The reverberation was felt through each of their bodies as it raced down from their arms like electricity. Hundreds of times they had fought on their small island, with dozens wooden swords they had made and worn with their own hands. That sensation never changed between them. One will pushing against another, and two children’s hearts full of shared memories on a sandy shore beating with a longing for the other. For Riku it felt like being home. With Sora he was home. His heart called out all the words he wouldn’t say.

Sora’s blue eyes grew wide as he continued to push against the against the man who had once thought to be a stranger. They had fought hundreds of times, and clashed sword against sword thousands of times. His body would never forget the feeling of fighting Riku. He and his heart would never forget.

“Riku?” His voice was small and cracking.

On the outside everything was so different from what they remembered, but still the familiar echoed out to them. No matter how much changed they still had that familiarity.

Beneath his hood Riku smiled.

“Sora.” His words were finally clear to the other. This was the only piece of himself he could give for now. This world was still in danger, the heartless still surrounding them, and the Storm Rider was still a potential threat. Riku raises his keyblade once more, a barrage of dark firaga let loose around Sora, hitting the heartless closing around him in a burst of flames and smoke.

He wished he could give him more time, wished they could fight longer, wished he could give him more than jus a tiny piece of himself, but he couldn’t stay. With Sora distracted, shielding his eyes from the smoke he started to run. He could have easily opened a corridor of darkness, but he wanted to linger as long as he could with Sora racing with him.

One day he’d be back home.

**Author's Note:**

> *** Comments and your thoughts on this work are always appreciated. Give this work a kudos if you liked it. Comments and kudos help me to create more work and figure out what I should work on. ***


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